I shared a cell with five bodies, MDC minister says

Nairobi: A close aide of Zimbabwe's prime minister was released on bail Thursday and told how he shared his prison cell with five dead bodies left for several days.

Roy Bennett, a white former farmer and adviser to Morgan Tsvangirai, was freed after his lawyers won a legal wrangle over his month-long imprisonment on terrorism charges. "Five people died while I was inside and it took the prison officers four to five days to remove the bodies," Bennett said as he emerged from prison in the town of Mutare, 188 miles east of the capital, Harare.

"There are gross human rights abuses behind those walls. People are suffering.... They are having a single meal a day. The situation behind there is pathetic."

Tsvangirai nominated Bennett to be deputy agriculture minister in the country's new coalition administration, but the former coffee farmer was arrested before he had a chance to take office. Bennett, whose land was seized several years ago, was arrested on February 13 over charges connected with an alleged plot in 2006 to assassinate President Robert Mugabe.

He has since been accused of "possessing arms for the purposes of banditry, terrorism and sabotage". His bail was approved the supreme court chief justice.